During my many years of managing RWA contests, I've seen a broad range of writing styles, from writers at all different skill levels.  And apart from grammatical concerns, two of the most common comments from judges were "lots of telling, not enough showing," and 'I didn't feel connected enough with the characters."

Whether you realize it or not, these two points are interrelated.  Consider which statement you feel more emotionally connected to:

Emma felt scared.  Or  Emma's heart pounded desperately in her throat.

Disgusted, Jack cursed his father and stormed out of the room.  Or  Disgust - a black, all-consuming emotion he'd thought done with- swamped him like a tidal rip.  'Damn you,' he choked out between stiff lips.  Then he stormed from the airless room, from the sonofabitch father who'd abandoned him thirty years ago.

The first examples are all about telling.  Do you feel anything (apart from a mild interest in what's making Emma scared and Jack angry?)  Telling creates a distance with the reader, as if they're not truly in the character's shoes and living the story.  But with showing (especially with character emotions), you are prompting a bodily response that readers can relate to and therefore, engage with the character.  While most of us may not have been in the exact same position as our characters, we have all felt extremes of emotion (shock, anger, joy, sorrow, envy, loss, passion) at some time in our lives.

As writers we want to create emotion within our readers - emotion means involvement which means they'll keep turning the pages.  And hopefully this will mean they'll go out and buy our next book.  We want them to worry about our hero's awful childhood, to feel scared when the bad guy abducts the heroine, to smile when the hero and heroine banter and flirt.  Let's face it, romance is an emotionally-driven genre, a genre which engages the senses, makes us laugh, cry and scream, and, as most authors can attest, drives readers to write some amazingly touching fan mail.

I believe the easiest way to show this is by example :  so here are some "before and afters" a few authors were kind enough to share.

First, here's one I prepared earlier:

Before (telling)

  Catherine felt sad and angry as she watched her plane take off from the departure lounge.  Billy will die now, she thought to herself with desperation.  James, her ex-husband, had crashed his car with her son inside and now Billy needed her blood to live.

Think about what Catherine would be thinking if you were her - all the emotion, the panic, the desperation - then put it down on the page.

After (showing)

    No, no!  Come back!  Catherine raced along the airport corridor but it was useless.  With a heaving sob she sagged against the departure lounge window, watching in disbelief as her plane taxied down the runway.  Billy's only hope of survival gone.

    Fingers tightened on her luggage handle, the stiff plastic cutting into her flesh.  Thanks to James, her deadbeat ex, her son was about to die.  I swear, she offered up a prayer to a deity she no longer believed in, if Billy doesn't survive this, I'll kill James myself.

Effective showing brings in emotion as well as the character's personality.  What kind of person do you think Catherine is?  A dedicated mum, sure, but in this small paragraph we also know:

Here's another example, this time from Anna Campbell's Tempt the Devil (Avon Books, February 2009)

Before:

  The Earl of Erith was happy that his affair with courtesan Olivia Raines proceeded to plan. But when he approached her house that morning, he saw her getting into a coach with concealed markings.  He drew his horse into the shadows and battled his immediate jealousy.  He demanded fidelity from a mistress and if Olivia couldn't give him that, he would end the affair.  But his curiosity and jealousy got the better of him so he decided to follow her.

After:

    Confound the faithless slut.

    He'd never chased a woman in his life. He had no intention of starting now.

    He was the Earl of Erith. Good women, bad women, young women, old women vied to catch his eye. Dear God, he could hardly take a step outside his front door without tripping over strumpets fighting for the right to wriggle into his bed.

    Her new lover was welcome to Olivia Raines. Let her…

    "Oh, Devil take it," he muttered. He dug his heels into his horse's sides and pursued the elegant carriage as it disappeared around the corner.

Of the changes, Anna says, "Version one is flat as a pancake whereas in version two, I tried to give the sense of the chaotic tumble of Erith's thoughts and emotions when he thinks Olivia has betrayed him after a night when he finally believes he's piercing the barriers she raises against him in their affair."

Here's another from Harlequin Presents author Trish Morey:

Before:

  Appalled at the insult he had just given her, she slapped his face in fury.  'How dare you!'

  But he didn't apologise.  He even had the nerve to make out it was somehow her fault, which only made things worse. Because she already knew she was stuck between a rock and a hard place. How could she bring up twin babies on her own?  She knew it would be tough going. But why should she be forced to marry him? He hadn't even deigned to ask her.

  Not that she wouldn't have said no if he had.

And here's how that scene is shown in Forced Wife - Royal Love-Child (HM&B Sexy - May 09)

After:

  Her open palm collided against his face with a crack that slammed his head sideways and left a deep red stain upon his olive-skinned cheek.

  'You bastard! I am nobody's whore!'

  He raised a hand to his face, rubbing the place she had hit and all the while he looked down at her. 'All I am trying to do is make the best of a situation.'

  'Take advantage of it, you mean!'

  'Which is better than pretending it doesn't exist!  Don't you think it's about time you faced the facts? You're pregnant with twins. My twins. What the hell else are you going to do?'

  'I don't know. But maybe you might have bloody well asked me to marry you, instead of just demanding I do.'

  'And would you have said yes?'

  'Not a snowball's chance in hell.'

  His jaw worked overtime, his eyes cold as flint. 'Then maybe it's just as well I didn't ask.'

Trish says: "Not only do these snippets show that it's important to use dialogue (where applicable) in showing rather than telling, it's also important to make that dialogue work overtime.  In the first example, the heroine says, 'how dare you?'  She's (rightly) incensed at the insult he's just dished out.  But in terms of impact, how does 'How dare you?' rate against, 'You bastard!  I am nobody's whore!' She's not merely taking umbrage, it's clear the gloves are off."

Ever been on a diet that restricts your eating or cuts out a particular food group?  No pasta/starch/dairy/carbs or (heaven forbid) chocolate.  Just like those diets, you should never completely cut out telling (unless you have an intolerance or allergy, which is something else entirely!).

Sometimes it's best to tell, depending on the story.  But the point is to understand why you're telling... if it's to get a fact across simply and quickly ("It was raining") then fine.  But be aware that by telling - especially when you are in a character's head - you may very well be keeping your reader at a distance, so they're not connecting with your characters or your story.   There are many ways to say "It was raining" that can bring your story to life and reveal your characters to the reader - "The rain came down in stinging sheets", "The rain kissed Emma's cheeks like a lovers touch", "As the wind howled outside, rain poured in through Emma's broken bedroom window."  Even "It was raining.  Again.  Emma loathed the rain."